ryethenovel Chapter 115 Meeting Jack Ma
Chapter 115 Meeting Jack Ma
Chapter 115 Meeting Jack Ma
While helping Yang Guofu Malatang get shut down, Lin Mu also began to push various established brands to adapt to Tmall's operations.
The manufacturer of White Rabbit took the initiative to approach him. After they joined Tmall, they opened a flagship store and achieved good results relying solely on organic traffic.
Now they want to advertise on Google and drive traffic, but they are not familiar with Taobao's rules, so they asked Lin Mu for advice. Lin Mu immediately gave them suggestions.
Even in 2009, the White Rabbit brand was a household name and a well-established brand.
Many people who are familiar with a brand will naturally buy it if they see it on Tmall and want to buy it: the core of brand marketing is to attract potential customers.
In other words, for those who know about White Rabbit but have no particular reason to buy it, just give them a clear application scenario.
Therefore, Lin Mu suggested that White Rabbit launch a gift box package, using an exquisite tin box, with the price increased several times over, mainly targeting the function of gift-giving.
After all, those who grew up eating White Rabbit candy are now adults and have started to have the need to visit relatives and friends.
When they see White Rabbit launching gift boxes, it inevitably evokes childhood memories; moreover, compared to ordinary packaging, gift boxes are more presentable and won't be embarrassing to give as gifts. In addition, White Rabbit milk candy itself has an outstanding taste, so there's no worry about a lack of market demand.
The manufacturer of White Rabbit accepted Lin Mu's proposal and quickly launched gift box packaging.
This gift set became an instant hit upon its release, and its popularity extended beyond online to offline sales.
The excited factory manager wrote a thank-you letter and sent it to Alibaba headquarters.
Besides being the manufacturer of White Rabbit milk candy, Lin Mu also helped another major food manufacturer, Panpan, to successfully establish itself on Tmall during this period.
In addition to its flagship product, Panpan Mini Bread, Panpan Foods is now embarking on a full-industry chain layout.
Lin Mu provided full assistance, helping them optimize product main images, analyze operational data, and provide feedback for improvement, thereby increasing the return on investment and image click-through rate. He also optimized customer service scripts to help them quickly adapt to the operational rhythm of Tmall.
In September, Lin Mu visited a high-end private restaurant to keep his appointment with Jack Ma.
The restaurant's decor is very simple, and even the waiters are the owner's family members, making it look like a small family-run restaurant.
At this moment, two people were seated in the hall. One, shorter in stature and with a distinctive appearance, was none other than Jack Ma; the other, dressed in a suit and tie, with a shrewd look in his eyes, was a stranger. Although Lin Mu didn't recognize him, being seated at the same table as Jack Ma was no small feat—
A person who is idle.
Jack Ma introduced with a smile: "This is Shen Wei, CEO of BBK Mobile."
Shen Wei quickly corrected him: "From now on, it should be called vivo. We've upgraded our brand."
"I see," Lin Mu suddenly realized. Speaking of vivo phones, its chairman, Duan Yongping, is also a highly legendary and extraordinary figure.
Duan Yongping has an engineering background. In 1993, he founded Subor, a learning machine that became popular throughout the country. Later, because the leaders of the state-owned enterprise broke their promises, he led a group of brothers to start their own business and established BBK.
Although the BBK learning machine is not cheap, it is exceptionally conscientious. Even in 2025, before he traveled through time, the English courseware for the BBK learning machine was still being updated for free on the official BBK website.
After the turn of the millennium, Duan Yongping ventured into the feature phone field and successfully transformed the business when the smartphone era arrived: OPPO and vivo are brands he incubated.
Today, Duan Yongping is enjoying his retirement in Australia and has successfully invested in well-known companies such as Moutai and NetEase.
However, Lin Mu was momentarily dazed. It turned out that vivo's predecessor was BBK Mobile.
He couldn't quite remember some of the little details of that era.
Jack Ma then introduced Lin Mu to Shen Wei, saying, "This is the very interesting young man I told you about, Lin Mu."
Shen Wei looked on in surprise and exclaimed, "Young people these days are amazing! When I was his age, I couldn't even make a decent PowerPoint presentation. There are so many talented people under President Ma's command!"
Lin Mu smiled shyly and didn't say anything more.
It's not that he can't say flattering things, but he feels there's no need to deliberately try to please others in this kind of situation.
At this level, what kind of highly emotionally intelligent people haven't they seen?
They themselves are masters of emotional intelligence, and Lin Mu knew his flattery skills weren't particularly outstanding; if he were to overdo it, it would backfire.
It's not good to flatter someone too much; it's better to be neither arrogant nor humble, to give your all when you should, and to quietly accompany them when you shouldn't.
Jack Ma took a sip of his drink and began to speak eloquently: "Xiao Lin, Shen Wei and I were just talking about what the future of the Chinese mobile phone market will look like with the issuance of 3G licenses. Shen Wei believes that domestic brands will definitely rise. The domestic industrial system is now so complete. As long as an industrial system is large enough, it will inevitably become stronger. Sooner or later, domestic mobile phone brands will go abroad and compete with overseas brands for the market."
Jack Ma paused for a moment, then smiled and said, "I told Shen Wei not to just focus on offline channels, but to also look at online channels. I think there's great potential in selling mobile phones online."
Lin Mu thought to himself: Sure enough, those at the forefront of the industry can see historical trends clearly. However, the difficulty is not in seeing the trend, but in steadily getting to the key position they want after knowing the trend.
Lin Mu immediately spoke up, "President Shen, currently no major mobile phone brands have joined Taobao Marketplace and Tmall. Would you like to be the first to try this?"
Shen Wei laughed heartily, "President Ma, look at the good soldiers you've trained! They even manage to drum up business for you while we're out for a meal!" After laughing, he composed himself and said seriously, "But what good does this do for the OV brand? Selling phones online will offend offline distributors; if the price is too high, customers won't buy; if it's too low, the distributors won't be happy; if the price is the same as offline, customers can't see or touch the phones online, so why wouldn't they buy them offline? I really don't see any benefit for OV in this, and I don't know what the point of doing it is."
Lin Mu quickly replied, "Yes, President Shen, there will definitely be benefits." Lin Mu knew in his heart that the time to show his strength had come, and this was precisely his area of expertise.
He said slowly, "President Shen, as the old saying goes, 'What a ruler rises by, he will also fall by.' You are currently relying too heavily on offline channels and major distributors. As times change, what made you successful in the past will inevitably become an obstacle to your future."
Shen Wei nodded in agreement, saying, "You have a point, but I still don't think online channels can open up a new future for 0V."
Lin Mu calmly explained, "President Shen, there are three advantages: First, you can get first-hand, real-time customer feedback and directly listen to users' needs and opinions; second, the core audience for online sales is young people, and OPPO and vivo are currently focusing on music phones aimed at young people, so the audience is highly compatible; third, to put it another way, you can sell off your unsold offline goods online at a low price and recover your funds faster, which is entirely beneficial to you."
Shen Wei was completely moved, especially by Lin Mu's point about "obtaining firsthand, real-time customer feedback"—a concept that truly connects with users.
Companies that don't consider their users won't last long.
Both OPPO and vivo are rooted in Duan Yongping's business philosophy: they can do marketing and sell at high prices, as long as they differentiate themselves and find the right market segment, earning a reasonable premium is perfectly acceptable. However, product quality must be up to standard, and they must adhere to long-termism. They cannot let users think that this is a garbage brand that only knows how to market, thereby losing their trust.
At this moment, vivo has a pain point: the offline channels are a mixed bag, and a lot of first-hand user feedback is being subjectively blocked by distributors.
The agents only want to sell phones and earn commissions, and they don't want to take responsibility for after-sales service, let alone spend time listening to the voices of users.
In today's domestic market, many companies believe in Machiavellianism, and even in 2025, many companies will still fail to do a good job of "respecting users".
Seeing that Shen Wei cared a lot about this, Lin Mu explained in detail how his company listened to first-hand user feedback, continuously iterated and upgraded products and services, and ultimately achieved differentiation in services and products.
Shen Wei became particularly interested when he heard about a case.
There was a shop selling stockings, and a regular customer who frequently bought from them provided a lot of feedback. A typical shop owner might have found this customer troublesome, but the shop owner listened carefully to every piece of feedback, constantly refining the product details, and ultimately creating a small but wildly popular stocking.
After listening, Shen Wei immediately said, "Xiao Lin, you've convinced me. I'll have someone open a flagship store on Tmall."
Taking advantage of the opportunity, Lin Mu suggested, "President Shen, I recommend that you take a batch of slow-moving goods to participate in Double Eleven. Let's make a big splash and boost Vivo's online reputation in one fell swoop!"